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Introduction
U.S. schools are known for low performance on international tests which measure 15-year-old students’ literacy in science, math, and reading. According to the 2007 report, the United States ranked 29th in science among 57 countries participating in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (Gonzalez and Kuenzi, 2012, p. 9; McFarlane, 2013, p. 39). The problems with school attainment were linked with students’ reduced interest in science and instructional approaches to science teaching (McFarlane, 2013, p. 39). In this regard the gaps highlighted administrators’ ineffective practices and teachers’ quality problem, which was explained by shortages of qualified teaching staff and insufficient support required for professional development (Gonzalez and Kuenzi, 2012, pp. 19-20). The results revealed weaknesses in STEM education which diminished U.S. global economic competitiveness and threatened national power. The weaknesses highlighted the necessity to reform STEM education in schools and promote science literacy across the states (Gonzalez and Kuenzi, 2012, pp. 2, 15; Kennedy and Odell, 2014, pp. 248-249; McFarlane, 2013, p. 39).
The current reforms aim to satisfy governmental demands to create the workforce that can “compete with the industrial forces of countries such as China and those in Europe” (Blades, 2016, p. 25). This policy explains the U.S. efforts to restore the international reputation for producing qualified scientists and engineers, and the government has been encouraging STEM education through various initiatives in order to compete the workforces of other countries. Specifically, A Framework for K-12 Science Education focuses on STEM education which typifies learning in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (Blades, 2016, pp. 23, 25). The fundamental stage of the U.S. STEM education embraces K-12 levels because school learning is prior to entry into the specific fields in the workplace (Kennedy and Odell, 2014, p. 247; Marginson, Tytler, Freeman, and Roberts, 2013, p. 30). Foundational knowledge of STEM fields can be formed in elementary schools, and hence, school teachers must provide background knowledge to learners. Centering on STEM fields in high schools is connected with students’ career opportunities in STEM industries.
While the reforms are taking place across K-12 levels, administrators may feel concerned about changing policies in STEM education and thus experience difficulties in managing STEM schools successfully. It can be hard for principals to recognize effective and ineffective practices in managing STEM schools, so they can face challenges with administration of the change in education models. If such problems arise, administrators fail to contribute to sustainability of STEM schools. Furthermore, administrators’ inappropriate level of education can hamper effective sustainable development in STEM schools. Alternatively, holding a master’s degree in educational management as a minimum is an advantage, since studying different aspects of management can lead to sustainability of schools. The quality of administrators’ education helps impart their knowledge, communicate standards to the teaching staff, and encourage public understanding of STEM (Balyer, 2012, p. 587; Tytler et al., 2015, pp. 8-9). In addition, principals leading STEM schools must be optimistic, outward looking, and aware of the school’s place in the local community (Jackson, 2009, p. 10).
As regards teaching staff, they may also exhibit difficulties in implementing the educational change in schools. If teachers are not knowledgeable about teaching paradigms in STEM education and if they are not fully aware of effective implementation of STEM curriculum, their students will not gain attainment in STEM fields. Instead, it is imperative for administrators to recruit and retain qualified staff whose teaching practice in STEM schools extends beyond traditional instruction (Goodpaster, Adedokun, and Weaver, 2012, pp. 9-10). Such teachers should take into account “affective, cognitive, and behavioral needs of their students and act responsively on a moment-to-moment basis” (Householder and Hailey, 2012, p. 15). Moreover, effective strategies of sustainable STEM schools are connected with delivery of the elaborated curriculum, which translates into higher rates of achievement (Jackson, 2009, p. 9). The curriculum engages students in STEM schools by teachers implementing instructional techniques which “challenge students to innovate and invent” (Kennedy and Odell, 2014, p. 254). This approach requires students to apply the knowledge gained in science and mathematics with the intention to find solutions to engineering problems through technology.
McFarlane (2013) claims that both administrators and teachers are responsible for ensuring that STEM curriculum and implemented instructional techniques are up-to-date (p. 38), and it is crucial to implement hands-on activities and develop educational models generally accepted among educators (Householder and Hailey, 2012, p. 52). In order to monitor effectiveness of the educational initiative, it is vital for administrators to implement effective strategies of sustainable STEM schools and track teachers’ progress in applying STEM curriculum.
Research Purpose
This research is associated with synthesizing and analyzing practices of administrators managing STEM schools and teachers implementing STEM curriculum, which explain how effectively sustainability can be achieved. The research purpose is to consolidate the data on successful practices implemented in sustainable STEM schools, and to undertake data collection and analysis relevant to the role of administrators who promote STEM education.
Research Questions
The following overarching research question guides the investigation: What are the key determinants of sustainable STEM schools and how do administrators contribute to their sustainability? Four research questions are developed on the basis of the study:
How well do current teachers assess themselves with regards to implementing STEM curriculum and what kind of instruments can administrators use to assess their attitudes towards change in education models and teaching paradigms?
What concerns do teachers have towards STEM education and what kind of instruments can administrators utilize to assess those concerns?
What challenges do school principals face with administration of STEM education, and how can one identify and describe the effective and ineffective practices of STEM administrators in managing STEM schools?
What instruments can policy makers employ to understand administrators’ concerns towards changing policies in STEM education?
Methodological Approach
Conducting research implies choosing the methodological approach that selects “one set of research methods over another” (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 72). In this regard the Concerns Based Adoption Model (CBAM) applied to school teachers, administrators, and policy makers serves as a useful theoretical perspective to investigate the key determinants of sustainable STEM schools because of its emphasis on the stakeholders’ perspectives with educational change as a key variant. With reference to STEM education and advancing educational initiatives in schools the framework “allows facilitators to identify the needs and concerns of teachers, and to plan, monitor, and implement new programs effectively” (Vaughan, 2002).
The framework is used to assess the educational change along the following three dimensions: Stages of Concern, Levels of Use, and Innovations Configurations. Accordingly, researchers can employ the following instruments: questionnaires describing the most effective aspect of STEM education, interviews to become aware of individuals’ behaviors during the educational change, and checklist maps to understand patterns of use occurring in implementation of the change.
CBAM highlights passing from self concerns, through task concerns, to impact concerns as teachers become more experienced with the use of STEM curriculum, and Stages of Concerns questionnaires stress how teachers and principals adopt the educational change and establish teachers’ familiarity with STEM education. The seven stages of concerns are built around self-concerns regarding personal capacity for implementing the educational change (unconcerned, informational, personal), task concerns to manage the day-to-day aspects of the change (management), and impact concerns embracing collaboration and adjustments to or improvement of the change (consequences, collaboration, refocusing) (Barrick, Myers, and Samy, 2015, pp. 49-50; LaRocco and Wilken, 2013, p. 3; Sherry, Billig, Tavalin, and Gibson, 2000, p. 2044; Vaughan, 2002). Self-concerns and task concerns constitute non-adopter stages, and their prevalence proves administrators’ and teachers’ inability to advance into the adopter stages.
The Stages of Concern derived from CBAM can be used to highlight teachers’ concerns towards STEM curriculum, which can be highly informative to administrators on how they can progress in implementing STEM education. Stages of Concerns questionnaires allow measuring the way teachers assess themselves with regards to implementing STEM curriculum, the types of concerns that teachers have towards STEM education, and hence, by extension administrators’ concerns towards changing policies in STEM education. As a result, the questionnaires provide the relevant data regarding the stakeholders’ concerns during implementation of STEM education in schools.
Levels of Use interviews center on behaviors germane to implementation of STEM education and provide the necessary data regarding assessment of teachers’ familiarity with change in education models and teaching paradigms. Specifically, administrators use the instruments to understand the degree to which teachers assess themselves in relation to implementation of STEM curriculum and the concerns which they express towards the educational change. Also, administrators’ and teachers’ readiness to implement STEM education can be measured this way. Such interviews can monitor development, evaluation, planning, and facilitation of STEM education, which present non-use, orientation, preparation, mechanical, routine, refinement, integration, and renewal levels of use (LaRocco and Wilken, 2013, p. 4).
The instruments of Stages of Concern, Levels of Use characterize the stages of adoption of STEM education in schools, which are based on the aforementioned levels of use. Each stage of adoption characterizes teachers implementing STEM curriculum within the categories: knowledge, acquiring information, sharing, assessing, planning, status reporting, and performing (Orr and Mrazek, 2009). The stage descriptions determine teachers’ readiness for adopting the educational change and are used as instruments administrators can utilize in order to assess teachers’ abilities towards change with reference to STEM education. In particular, the knowledge descriptor focuses on cognitive knowledge about the STEM curriculum, their characteristics, the area of implementation, and the possible outcomes. As regards the descriptor of acquiring information, it refers to enquiring about STEM education when addressing other teachers, administrators, and policy makers. The sharing descriptor involves discussing plans, strategies, outcomes, and problems relevant to implementation of STEM curriculum with other stakeholders. The next descriptor implies assessing, which is linked with analysis of the potential of the educational change and its actual implementation. Designing the process of implementing and adopting STEM education is revealed in the planning descriptor. The status reporting descriptor determines individuals’ status in terms of implementing and adopting the change. Lastly, the performing descriptor examines the degree to which activities are required for effective execution of STEM education (Orr and Mrazek, 2009).
The Innovation Configuration Checklist map aids in identifying and describing effective and ineffective practices of STEM administrators in managing STEM schools after recognizing challenges principals face with implementation of the educational change. The practices embrace the categories of frequency (implementation of STEM education), fidelity (level of its implementation), and reporting (data collection) (González-Carriedo and Tunks, 2016, p. 155). In this respect researchers can describe individual variations in implementing STEM education, track the progress during the change, and group the practices in STEM schools. Learning about effective practices in STEM schools may be crucial for successful integration of the change.
Specifics of the Research Design
The research design allows connecting the methodological approach and a set of research methods with the intention to address research questions (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 72). Also, data collection and data analysis assist in linking the research questions to the research conclusions within the research design (Baškarada, 2014, p. 5). The current investigation is being conducted with a qualitative research when the researcher employs several data collection techniques and analyzes the obtained data by resorting to multiple methods and applying qualitative procedures to answer the research questions (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 73). The design implies gaining profound knowledge in the study of sustainable STEM schools.
The case study research involves different sites for investigation, which allows obtaining a clear picture of the current school practices and gaining a deep holistic view of the research problem germane to sustainability of STEM schools after receiving confirmatory and explanatory findings (Baškarada, 2014, pp. 1, 3). The participants of the research are three school administrators from two STEM elementary schools and one STEM high school. Prior observations about practices in these schools enable exploration of their sustainability in the current research. In this regard a purposive sampling method assists in gathering information relevant to the research questions, because administrators have the best knowledge about sustainability of STEM schools (Elo, Kääriäinen, Kanste, Pölkki, Utriainen, & Kyngäs, 2014, p. 4; Wahyuni, 2012, p. 73).
The case study research enables data triangulation, which constitutes collection of primary and secondary data from different sources. Semi-structured interviews with administrators and teachers serve as the primary data (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 73). As regards the secondary data, it includes publications relevant to the research paper provided within the schools or available publicly, and the administrators usually provide the data before or after the interviews. The secondary data normally include direct observations, archiving records about reporting structures, documents revealing schools’ functional areas, and school principals’ responsibilities (Baškarada, 2014, p. 11). The data obtained from multiple sources establishes consistency of the investigation.
A constructed interview method establishes the process of data collection, and the method is associated with a semi-structured interview which serves as an intermediate link between a structured and in-depth interview and enables management of the interview by utilizing pre-planned questions and keeping flexibility. Such interviews allow prompting more information when some novel data emerges (Baškarada, 2014, p. 11). Semi-structured interviews undergo procedures from preparing the questions and developing the interview guides to the process of interviewing (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 74). Specifically, after designing questions peers should partake in conducting interviews in order to eliminate any misunderstood questions. Also, colleagues can participate in mock interviews so that interview guides can be practiced.
A preliminary meeting may be held before the actual interview, presumably a week before, in order to “establish trust with the participant, review ethical considerations and complete consent forms” (Englander, 2012, p. 27). In this regard administrators and teachers are informed about the research purpose and are asked about the consent to participate in the study. The informed consent is linked with ethical approval prior to interviewing as well as with confidentiality of the identities and the obtained data during the research, so anonymity of the participants and school locations is supported by the use of pseudonyms. What is more, “potential participants should also be informed about the research timeframe, the proposed nature of their involvement, and the expected practical outcomes” (Baškarada, 2014, p. 10).
The interview protocol begins with briefing and comprises questions relevant to the research questions. The interviews are conducted on a planned day, and the permission is granted in order to record the 40-60 minute interviews and make the relevant notes as research memos. Observational, methodological, and theoretical memos are likely to bring additional information to the study (Wahyuni, 2012, pp. 74-75). The interviewer facilitates the discussion and listens to administrators’ responses attentively and notes down the answers; he or she should establish “eye contact and a confident manner to set the tone for the interview and help establish rapport with the respondent” (Baškarada, 2014, pp. 12-13). The interview protocol finishes with debriefing to gain more information about the sustainability of STEM schools.
Data analysis is performed on the basis of the content analysis method, and its employment allows examining similar qualitative data and commenting on it. Applying methodological triangulation in doing research is linked with multi-method application to focus on data preparation and qualitative data analysis, which enables increased internal validity of the study (Baškarada, 2014, p. 8; Wahyuni, 2012, pp. 75-76). As regards data preparation, it is crucial to take into consideration storage of the collected data on the computer and having hard copies of the information; otherwise the “data may become corrupted during collection, transmission, storage, integration, retrieval, and analysis” (Baškarada, 2014, p. 9).
Furthermore, the data organization procedures contribute to the process of data analysis, because it is fundamental to gather the relevant data accurately by listening to the recorded information, transcribing the interview session verbatim, and reviewing the transcripts. Here anonymity involves using coding which replaces the identity of STEM schools. In this respect the constant comparative approach indicates analysis of recurrent responses or activities to be categorized. Similarity of the participants’ views enables generalization of the key determinants of sustainable STEM schools and administrators’ contribution to their sustainability.
Limitations of the Research Approach
Several limitations exist for investigating successful practices implemented in sustainable STEM schools and the relevant role of administrators. This paper presents a complex area of exploration, which requires clarifying the possible restrictions in order to avoid any misinterpretations of the obtained findings. The study accepts teachers and administrators who voluntarily participate in the investigation, which highlights the first restriction relevant to transferability to the population. The restriction means that the findings obtained in two STEM elementary schools and one STEM high school may not be fully applied to other schools across the states. Therefore the results cannot be generalized beyond the context of the research, which is “the major point of criticism of qualitative research” (Wahyuni, 2012, p. 77).
The next limitation correlates with the subjective interpretation of the gathered data germane to the school locations. This restriction explicates that other researchers interpreting the data may present slightly differentiated results, which may not be valid for other STEM schools in the United States. The third limitation is connected with a small sample size, since the investigation is confined only to three school principals presenting different stages of STEM education. Although this sampling alongside with the participated teaching staff is suitable for the research, the findings may not be fully applicable to other education settings.
The findings are built on pre- and post-participation responses based on identifying the degree to which STEM teachers assess themselves with regards to implementing STEM curriculum, teachers’ concerns towards STEM education, challenges school principals face with implementation of STEM education, and administrators’ concerns towards changing policies in STEM education. Future research can explore additional key determinants relevant to sustainability of STEM schools.
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